Analyst: Hosted UC can be a great deal for SMBs.

"I'm not announcing that 2011 is the year of hosted UC, but I will say that more and more companiesof all sizesare looking into hosted services as an option for deploying UC. It's clear that hosted UC will be interesting to companies both large and small, but these services currently can make the most sense for SMBs," writes COMMfusion principal analyst Blair Pleasant on the No Jitter blog.

"I recently interviewed several hosted providers focusing their offers at small businesses, and was pleased to see that there are some very comprehensive UC services available at reasonable prices for SMBs. On the other hand, it's not as easy to shop and compare vendors, as Ill explain shortly. Rather than working with VARs and resellers, most hosted services are sold directly by the providers, mainly via their websites, focusing on features and pricing," Pleasant writes.